


Your Sky

by TheHangedMan



Category: Granblue Fantasy (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Lucifer Lives, Domestic Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Suspense
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-21
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:47:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24308464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheHangedMan/pseuds/TheHangedMan
Summary: The walls of their shared bedroom pressed in on Lucifer. The realization had finished forming, and now, lay tangibly in front of him. The form it took was that of an empty window. It was bitter and he wished he could put it back, return to pleasant dreams and sweet summer days.For happiness, there was always a price.
Relationships: Lucifer/Sandalphon (Granblue Fantasy)
Comments: 22
Kudos: 102





	1. Stranger

It was a year after the skies had settled that Lucifer officially stepped down from his role as supreme primarch. Retirement, Uriel jokingly called it, much to Michael’s distaste —they were not old, she emphasized— but the sentiment was the same. They were done, free to live out the rest of their lives as humans. Arm in arm, Lucifer and Sandalphon left Canaan and settled down quietly.

The house Lucifer built with Sandalphon was a few miles away from the nearest village, tucked away in a valley that stayed in full bloom year round. It was both close enough to civilization to not be too isolated, and private enough for them to be left mostly alone. They enjoyed the company of skydwellers, but both of them were far more comfortable with their solitude. Sandalphon had chosen the spot, flown right toward it. 

Lucifer knew it had to be fate.

It was not the sturdiest thing, not at first, at least. Uriel and his apprentice Alexiel paid them a visit and helped them rework the entire foundation in stone so that they no longer had to fear a strong windstorm sweeping away the hard work. When they were finished, the building was hardly recognizable.

Uriel wasn’t the only visitor to assist them— many others came once they’d settled down. It was Rosetta and Yggdrasil who helped Lucifer plant his garden, acquiring various seeds and teaching him the best way to cultivate the wild plants, while Gabriel and Europa sang to the mountain spring to water their flowers. Raphael moved the windows and patched the walls to redirect a pleasant breeze so it would cool the house during the hottest days of the year. Grimnir showed up a few days too late to help with the windows, but he came with an armful of colorful toy windmills to decorate the garden pots with. 

Michael had to be convinced to visit with persistent letters and some prodding from Gabriel. Once she was there, with Shiva in tow, she was strong-armed into letting herself relax. The pair of them were stiff and overly formal, but it was nothing a few days of sunshine, fresh mountain air, and near endless rounds of iced coffee couldn’t fix. Before Lucifer knew it, Michael had become one of their most frequent visitors.

Spring faded to summer and the wildflowers only grew ever more vibrant. Lucifer had to remember to thank Raphael for helping them with the windows; the kind winds made the short, stuffy nights far more bearable. Lucifer often found himself alone with his thoughts in bed, watching the joyful pinwheels spin in the window planter. Beside him Sandalphon slept, blissfully unaware of the weight of the sky that remained ever in Lucifer’s thoughts. Laying his worries to rest was not something that came naturally. After so many years of watching over the ebb and flow of life, he couldn’t always drift off peacefully. 

Sandalphon did not sleep as one without troubles would. Countless nights he tossed and turned, tumbling through nightmares that Lucifer wished he could chase away himself. Pandemonium must have been far harsher on him than Lucifer could have ever imagined. Guilt stirred in the pit of his stomach. 

Something about Sandalphon had been different since he emerged from his feathered cocoon. He seemed calmer, quieter— more mature, maybe? The cradle might have given him just the right atmosphere to think about his actions, as Lucifer hoped it would. But what force had driven Sandalphon to emerge from his cocoon? He’d come at just the right time to miraculously block the blow that should have claimed Lucifer’s life. How had he known of Belial’s plot to revive Lucilius, and thwarted it at every turn? Sandalphon had said the beasts of Pandemonium talked, but… how much could they know?

In the end, did it matter? They were together and the skies were at peace.

Lucifer heard Sandalphon stir beside him. Lucifer smiled in his direction. “I didn’t disturb you, did I?”

“No.” Sleepily, Sandalphon rolled over to face him. “Can’t sleep?”

“Looks like my thoughts are chasing away the dreams.”

“What’s on your mind?”

“The sky.”

“The sky?”

“Always the sky,” Lucifer admitted with a soft laugh. “I understand it’s not my responsibility any longer, but it doesn’t entirely free me from my fretting.” 

“It’s hard to let go,” Sandalphon sympathized.

“Yes, I imagine this is what a parent feels when they send off a child to find their way in the world. I would not have given it up unless I was certain that it was ready. It’s a difficult feeling to explain, I apologize. This must sound strange to you.”

“Not at all.” Sandalphon’s eyes focused on the ceiling, his gaze distant. “You protected it for so long on your own, it must have felt like a part of you in the end. But you can finally rest now knowing that what you care for so deeply is safe.”

“Yes, and I will, gladly,” Lucifer murmured, his eyes ever fixed on Sandalphon. “This world, it’s breathtaking. It’s different experiencing all of it up close. I find myself more in love with the skies with each passing day.”

A soft smile graced Sandalphon’s lips. “It’s beautiful here.”

“You know,” Lucifer said, mulling his words, “I would have entrusted it all to you… had anything happened to me, had things gone differently.”

“I know.” Sandalphon’s gentle expression fell, and a look of deep sorrow overcame his features. Lucifer was taken aback. When had that bright spark of naivete left Sandalphon’s eyes? Had it been during the rebellion, or was it after the cataclysms? “I also would have given my life to protect it.”

Lucifer paused in contemplation. “I’m glad that it never came to that for either of us, but all things considered, you would have made a wonderful supreme primarch.”

“I’m not so sure about that.” Sandalphon laughed, but there was still an air of sadness about the music of his voice. “Pretty big shoes to fill.”

“Sandalphon, is something the matter?”

There was a sudden change in Sandalphon’s face as something that had been held at bay for too long was released. A violent flash of pain and sorrow spilled out onto Sandalphon’s cheeks. He wiped the wetness away quickly. “Sorry, the thought of not being beside you like this, it’s painful.”

Lucifer reached his hand forward and stroked a thumb across Sandalphon’s cheek. Sandalphon stiffened against the touch. “I regret what I did to you, for Pandemonium. I know nothing I say will make up for it, but I am truly sorry. There were other ways—”

The angel shook his head, pulling away from Lucifer’s touch. “It’s in the past. I’ve had years to think about it. I understand why you did what you did.”

Years? 

That was odd, it couldn’t have been more than six or seven months since Sandalphon had burst from his cocoon. Up until then, he had only been out of Pandemonium for a little over a year. Did time distort in that inescapable prison? Maybe Sandalphon’s perception of its passage had also been changed. “All that time alone must have been difficult for you.”

“It was.” Sandalphon’s fingertips brushed up against him so lightly that, had Lucifer not seen them make contact, he would have thought he imagined the touch. He seemed far away. “It was harder than anything I could have ever imagined. But I feel it helped me understand your long, lonely vigil.” 

The statement had an unsettling wrongness about it. Lucifer opened his mouth to address it, but the moment was past.

“You should try to sleep. We’re going to be up early tomorrow planting the orchard.” Sandalphon rolled over onto his side, ending the conversation.

“Yes, I suppose I should.” Lucifer stared after him, a frown forming on his lips.

——————————————

They planted a very small grove of peach trees just outside of what they could now confidently call their completed cottage. While neither of them had much experience in growing trees, they had been reassured by both Rosetta and Yggdrasil.“It’s warm and there’s plenty of sunshine here, it would be a shame to put it to waste. The soil’s perfect and it’s humid enough, just give it a try.” Rosetta pushed as she straightened out the stem of a bent lily, persuading it to stand tall again.

Lucifer gazed out over the rolling fields that surrounded them. There seemed like there would be plenty of space, at least. “Are you sure? Peach trees seem like they would be delicate, easy to kill on accident.”

A warm laugh, followed by the very amused chiming of bells, answered him. It must have been some private joke between the two of them. “Don’t worry. We won’t let you fail. Siero has connections for the saplings; I’ll let her know you’d like some sent over.”

“We have no choice then.” Lucifer smiled helplessly. He glanced over to Sandalphon, who seemed preoccupied with managing the distribution of potting soil in a window planter. “So long as we’re at it, we could grow coffee beans as well. What do you think, Sandalphon?”

There was a small delay in which Sandalphon stopped his movements abruptly, contemplating the words. Then, slowly, he set down his garden trowel and turned to face the three of them. “That sounds like a wonderful idea. We may need to build a greenhouse for them however.” A smile forced its way onto his cheeks.

“If the suggestion is not agreeable then—“

Lucifer began to speak, but he was cut short by Rosetta’s delighted clap. He startled, dropping the bag of soil (thankfully still closed) he’d been carrying. Neither of the girls seemed to take notice of the blunder, but Sandalphon raised a hand to his lips, stifling a well-meaning laugh.

“It’s settled.” Rosetta stood, brushing the dust off of her skirts. “How about a dozen of each?”

“... Half a dozen.” 

The coffee shrubs and peach trees arrived a month later after they’d cleared spots for them along the side of their cottage. Rosetta had cautioned them not to plant the peach trees too close together and to keep the soil damp at all times without overwatering. She assured them that so long as they kept a schedule, and the house didn’t block their sunlight, they would have six trees on their hands more than happy to produce fruit in a few years.

Lucifer was vigilant in his care for them. A strict watering schedule was drafted up and added to the calendar with the vegetables and flowers. He was meticulous about weeding the roots covering them when the weather turned especially foul. Sandalphon didn’t take the same level of interest in their upkeep as he did with the coffee plants, but he did seem curious. Oftentimes, when Sandalphon thought no one was looking, Lucifer would catch him assessing the trees with a critical eye, pacing up and down the neat row wordlessly. 

——————————————

For so many, many years, Lucifer had watched the world pass by as nothing more than its shepherd. Always, he had been an outsider among even the other primarchs, unsuited for work that took a more personal touch. Lucilius had set him apart when he had created him, designing him specifically for the task he was to fulfill. Even Belial, whose capabilities had been equal to his, only made it clear that the role Lucifer had been given inherently created distance between him and all others. To revoke his role and live among skydwellers, who grew old and died beneath the very sun that gave life, he had never allowed himself to want for it— to question the role he had been given or the one that had put it in place. At least, he had not until Sandalphon.

Sandalphon who was joy, passion, and life incarnate. He, who taught Lucifer to love the sky all over again with his big curious eyes and clumsy hands. To know something was one thing, but to hold something, to feel it beneath your fingers and taste it with your mouth, was something else. He loved the sky, but he had never loved it in the same way that Sandalphon had. 

If not for Sandalphon, Lucifer feared he would have remained the stagnant statue who stood watch over a living world and felt nothing towards it. He would have been just another cog in a machine, that turned and turned, despite finding no purpose in the act of turning. Lucilius, his dear friend, would have brought ruin upon the earth in the same breath that he had used to speak life, and Lucifer would have done nothing to stop him.

So even as he lay awake again, his thoughts of the sky and the stars ever chasing away his sleep, he thought of the joy there was to find in the simple things that the residents of the sky might take for granted. He closed his eyes and let the sounds of the night permeate his skin. The crickets chirped and a far off owl hooted, complimenting the gentle music of the wind chime he’d hung by their front door. 

Canaan had been so quiet. The change was nice.

A weight lifted off the bed beside him, shifting the mattress beneath him. Lucifer opened his eyes with a start and turned towards what he thought was his slumbering companion. Sandalphon rose slowly from the bed and, quiet as the dead, he moved over to the open window. The way he moved was otherworldly, as if he were a phantom, an illusion that did not belong here. As he stepped in front of the window, Lucifer half expected the moonlight to pass straight through him.

It did not.

“It’s late.” Lucifer called out to him.

“I know.”

He sat up in bed. “Was it another night terror?”

“Yes.”

“What was it about?” The man did not turn to look at him, but Lucifer saw the way his posture shifted. Sandalphon’s hands alighted on the frame and he peered out into the clear night before him. 

“I dreamed of a sky painted red with blood and of the wall of black that devoured it. There was... a headless man whose dreams fell to ruin in the hands of one ill suited to carry them. I dreamed of a man who was tasked to speak truth, but sewed his mouth shut in favor of his fantasies.” The voice sounded like Sandalphon’s, and yet, the words were not his. There was too much concealed behind the riddles. 

Something was building in Lucifer’s chest, an earth shattering realization that he did not understand. His mouth opened and his lungs expanded, but the air was suddenly too thick. “Is it always the same?”

“It has always been the same,” Sandalphon’s grip on the windowsill tightened, “and it always will be. Failure is a ghost that haunts relentlessly.”

Stop. Lucifer wanted to say, to end this train this conversation. “What reason do you have to feel as though you’ve failed? The world is at peace, all is well. Come back to bed.”

Sandalphon didn’t budge nor did he speak.

Lucifer pulled away the sheets and stood. The name did not sound right on his tongue. “What’s bothering you? I don’t understand. Any mistake you’ve made you’ve atoned for. You saved my life when you stopped Beelzebub from—”

The cogs in his head began to turn.

"Sandalphon, how did you know of Beelzebub's intentions to assassinate me?" 

How swiftly Sandalphon had burst from the confines of the crib, nearly tearing the wings apart in order to deflect the blow intended for Lucifer. Lucifer had been prepared to take the blow with his body, but Sandalphon’s instincts had saved him. He'd acted as if he knew exactly where the weapon would materialize. 

Rose colored glasses and one way mirrors had concealed how inherently wrong Sandalphon had acted since he returned. Would the angel Lucifer knew back in the garden have plunged his fist into Belial’s core, extinguished his life without a second thought? Should Sandalphon have forgiven him so quickly for all of the wrongs Lucifer had committed against him? 

“I knew,” A long deep exhale followed and Sandalphon tensed, “because once before, I had been too late.” 

And then, as he finished his riddle, Sandalphon was turning back towards him, staring straight at him. From where he stood, across the room, Sandalphon still pierced him with those blood red eyes. For the first time, Lucifer was struck by how guarded they seemed. “I have been deceiving you.”

From Sandalphon’s back not two, or four, or even six, but twelve wings sprouted, throwing brilliant prismatic light around the room. His brown wings were there among the others, four of which he had once stolen from the archangels, but the last six, the brilliant white ones, Lucifer could not explain. They were his, the wings of the supreme primarch.

Lucifer stared at him quietly, assessing the impossibility before him, his expression carefully neutral. None of those colored wings should have been there. Lucifer could still feel his own wings dwelling within his own core. Just last week he’d seen Michael spread hers out over the open fields. They couldn’t be there.

Sandalphon returned the look with a similar mask over his features, awaiting Lucifer’s response. It never came; the words escaped him. And so, after a long silence, Sandalphon exhaled a deep breath and his shoulders sagged. He tucked the twelve rainbow wings against himself and stepped up into the low windowsill, fitting into it easily despite the many feathers about him. “What I did, I did not do with the intent of causing you pain. I was not created to live without you.” He took off from the ledge.

The walls of their shared bedroom pressed in on Lucifer. The realization had finished forming. It lay now, tangibly in front of him, in the form of the empty window. It was bitter and he wished he could put it back, return to pleasant dreams and sweet summer days. 

That was not his Sandalphon. 

——————————————

The Sandalphon that was not his Sandalphon was unexplainably gone for two days. For two days, Lucifer was left to stew his own thoughts. With one question answered, even more began to rattle around in Lucifer’s skull.

When Sandalphon returned, it was mid-afternoon and he came in through the front door, not the window. He was careful to scrape the mud and dirt off of the bottoms of his heels as he entered the kitchen. A thick black coat was hung up on the coat rack. Lucifer could not remember him taking it when he left.

Lucifer watched him carefully from where he was seated at the kitchen table. His morning coffee had long ago grown cold from neglect. Sandalphon did not look up at him as he removed his shoes.

“Who are you?” Lucifer did not wait for him to finish settling; he shattered the silence.

“Sandalph—“

“No.” Lucifer interrupted the other, studying him carefully. 

“I am,” The one also called Sandalphon reaffirmed, keeping his eyes cast downward as he lined his shoes up along the shoe rack, “but not the one you created.”

“Not the one…” A torrent of emotions, struck Lucifer. He had not experienced inner turmoil like this since he cut down his creator and cast his creation into the pit. “Where is Sandalphon?” 

“It would be better if I didn’t—”

“Tell me.” 

Sandalphon’s mouth formed around a reply and then extinguished it. His eyes closed and, for a long moment, he just stood there, still as a statue, framed by the doorway they had put up together. When he opened them again, he tilted his head up and met Lucifer’s gaze with a look like a cornered animal flashing through his eyes. Everything in Lucifer told him to go to him, to embrace Sandalphon, but no, he couldn’t. Despite the familiar mask he wore, this was not his Sandalphon.

“The Sandalphon you created is no more. He died in his cradle.”

The bottom of Lucifer’s stomach dropped out. The air caught in his throat. “No…”

“Unable to face you again,” The other Sandalphon struggled to finish. His eyes were on Lucifer, but he stared straight through him., “Hhe took his own life. He did this in order to escape another eternal prison… and to repent for the wrong he did to you.”

“He’s…?”

“Dead. He was gone before I arrived. There was nothing I could do to resuscitate him.”

Lucifer stood abruptly, knocking into the table as he did so. The sound of shattering glass met his ears, but it hardly registered. He stepped forward, towards the other Sandalphon, closing the space between the two of them. Sandalphon was there, he was right there! But this wasn’t him. It was all too much. Lucifer needed answers, but he also needed air. He pushed through the feeling of anxiety. “How do you know how he felt?” The question of a desperate man who had nowhere to flee to. 

Guilt overtook the other Sandalphon’s expression. He stepped back in the direction of the front door, attempting to put more distance between the pair of them. But then he stopped and something changed in him abruptly; he stood his ground. 

“I know how he felt because, at my darkest point, it was something I also considered.”

Lucifer froze. 

Sandalphon’s gaze drifted down to rest on Lucifer’s jaw, then to his throat and then stopped at his chest. The pinpricks of tears were back in his eyes, but his voice faltered no more. “After the rebellion and the cataclysms, I was angry and I was empty. Armed with nothing but my own weaponized thoughts, I nearly drove myself to madness. Were it not for the Singularity’s intervention I too would have… but in the end, I didn’t. I didn’t because she was there. Your memory gave me a new purpose, and that purpose filled me with life again.”

“Who are you?” 

“I am Sandalphon, just not your Sandalphon. I come from a sky the same as this one, alike in almost every single way, except for one.” Sandalphon swallowed hard. “The Lucifer of my world died before I left my cradle, leaving me his legacy behind and a promise to fulfill. In the end, many thousands of years later, I was unable to keep it, to protect the sky that he so deeply cherished. I don’t know how I arrived here or why I was given this second chance, but please, believe me. I did not intend to cause you grief.”

“I do.” Lucifer’s shoulders sagged. “I believe you.”

Still trapped in the doorway, Sandalphon withdrew into himself, hugging his arms to his chest. “I was… overwhelmed by the joy I felt seeing you whole again. It was unjust of me to withhold the truth from you. For that, I apologize. If you prefer, I can leave you. Just knowing that you’re alive and well somewhere within this sky is enough for me.”

“No, don’t—” Lucifer felt his own voice breaking around the words. His legs weakened and he sank down onto his knees. Even if this Sandalphon was not his, to be apart from him at this moment would do nothing but deepen the well of his sorrows. “Please, don’t leave.”

——————————————

Summer changed to Autumn and the valley was bathed in brilliant color. Reds and golds littered the cold ground and the hardy winter flowers began to awaken from their year-long slumbers. It was phenomenal to see so many different species of plant life hidden beneath the rich soil. Lucifer found himself fascinated by them and at Sandalphon’s prompting, he began to collect the sprouts to move to his garden in order to study them more closely. He began to keep a journal in order to catalogue their growth and development.

It had saddened Lucifer to see the summer flowers wilt, and he feared that the same fate would befall the coffee plant if they intended to grow on. He mentioned as much over their morning coffee and that very same day, Sandalphon began to draft up designs for a greenhouse. Lucifer watched him work, surprised at how adept he was at the design and construction of the structure. Sandalphon explained that during his time on the Grandcypher, he had helped to maintain a small garden on the deck sheltered by a greenhouse.

Once again, the illusion was broken.

Lucifer tried to uphold the fantasy that things were as he once thought they were, but he could feel the rift growing between the two of them and felt helpless to stop it. Now that the truth was out in the open, Lucifer began to take notice of the differences between the two of Sandalphons. This Sandalphon could drain a tankard of whisky without flinching or flushing. His Sandalphon would have struggled to swallow a mouthful. Lucifer missed the way that his Sandalphon used to wear every emotion clearly on his face, while this one buried and concealed his thoughts, filtering out what he said through long moments of contemplation. This Sandalphon was colder, more reserved, and flighty to the touch. He felt so much further away, so much harder to reach.This was not the Sandalphon he had molded with his own hands; not the one he had poured his heart and soul into. That Sandalphon Lucifer had abandoned in his cradle, left to wallow in despair. Lucifer might as well have used his own hands to take his life.

Even with the cooler weather, sleep continued to evade him. When it did come, his dreams served only as grim reminders of his failure. Too often he found himself awoken from peaceful revieries, of his times spent in the garden with his Sandalphon, to the stranger beside him. 

Sandalphon, this other Sandalphon, was always trapped in nightmares of his own. If Lucifer were a different man, a better man, he would have thrown his own reservations to the wind. He would have woken him softly, embraced him tenderly. But he was as much a prisoner of his past as the man beside him. 

What would this Sandalphon think of him if he did? Lucifer couldn’t begin to guess. Would he assume that Lucifer was ingenuine? Would Sandalphon think that he was being used as a stand-in for another? Lucifer couldn’t bear to hurt him in such a way.

So, instead, Lucifer curled up into himself as Sandalphon thrashed around in his sleep. As muffled sobs escaped his usually stoic companion, Lucifer let his eyes burn holes into the windowsill, tracing the movements of the tiny paper windmill that spun and spun, blissfully unaware. The summer flowers he’d planted had died weeks ago and the winter sprouts he’d replaced them with had not yet surfaced, leaving the planter seemingly vacant of life. 

What would he have found in that cradle had this Sandalphon not come from it? Would it have been empty? Would he have found nothing but a burnt out core? Or when Lucifer had finally grown too tired of waiting and he had bid those feathered wings to unfurl, would he have been met with the body of his beloved, cold and devoid of life? Truthfully, he knew he never would have discovered the truth. He would have perished protecting the cradle as the Lucifer of the other Sandalphon’s world had. Except that in this world, the cradle had been empty.

Sandalphon awoke from his tossing and turning from time to time, out of breath and shaking. When he did, if he noticed that Lucifer was awake, he would acknowledge the other with a quiet word or two and then rise to leave even in the dead of night. Then, always careful to avoid the planter, he would climb to the windowsill and slide open the shutters the rest of the way to perch there. The moonlight would bathe him in brilliant light, illuminating the soft brown messy curls of his hair and the angles of his face. He would spread out those beautiful sparrow wings that painfully reminded Lucifer of a different time, another life, and leap from his roost to sink into the night outside.

If only things could be different. If only Lucifer knew how to bridge the gap between them.

——————————————

By the time the greenhouse was finished, it was already the first week of winter and most of the summer plants were already doomed. It was a mad scramble to try to get them to green their leaves again; to turn sad looking petals back towards the sun. For the most part, they failed in this endeavor. 

At Lucifer’s request, Michael and Gabriel paid them both a visit after the first of December and examined the greenhouse and the sad-looking plant life within. After a thorough inspection, Michael informed them that, despite Sandalphon’s careful design, the room was still too cold and dry to support plants that were used to such intense summer heat and humidity. 

After the ordeal of building the greenhouse, it was not the news they were prepared to hear. Lucifer was disheartened. Gabriel, however, assured them that there were other ways of getting the design to work. She sat Sandalphon down between her and Micheal and took a red pencil to his blueprints. They instructed him how to run water, propelled only by gravity and a little bit of wind power, continuously through heated metal pipes. Those pipes in turn would vent steam into the greenhouse and warm the earth beneath it.

It was complex and would be a bit of an undertaking. Not to mention that it wouldn’t be ready in time for this year, but it filled the pair of them with a new determination to succeed. Like a pair of parched animals searching for water during a drought, they dug up the earth. It was hard work and they did it stubbornly with their hands. The tracks were plotted and vents marked out within two days. It took about that long for the rest of their supplies to arrive. Siero, through means of Halluel and Malluel’s new speedy delivery service, sent them the pipes and connectors.

About halfway through the installation process, Grimnir stumbled back into their home, supposedly lost in another wild goose chase attempting to find Raphael. He was delighted to see that his windmills were being put to use decorating the (now barren) garden and windows. So much so in fact, that he loudly proclaimed he was capable of far greater designs. Sandalphon saw this as an opportunity for free labor, much to Lucifer’s disapproval, and put him to work assisting him in the construction of a small wind turbine. While he was there, they did feed him very well; stuffing him full of wild berry tarts, steamed vegetables and roasted nuts. They also offered him a couch to crash on, which, as Sandalphon stated, was more than enough to pay him back for the work.

As far as Lucifer could tell, Grimnir did enjoy the time he spent with them. When he left, he did so reluctantly and only after his work was completed. They loaded up his arms with various wild fruits that Lucifer had jarred and preserved during the fall. In a few years they would have peaches for him. 

With their project finished, Lucifer and Sandalphon were left to relax and enjoy the first snow from inside the comfort of their own home. The cobblestone hearth roared at all hours of the day and night, keeping the cold at bay. Without the warm weather to allow them to spend their days outdoors, Lucifer found the pair of them trapped in closer proximity than before. It made his heart ache to have this Sandalphon so near to him. Everything he did was an echoing reminder of the person he had known back in the garden; his one true solace from the troubles of this world. 

Lucifer would catch himself staring, longingly, in the small angel’s direction more often than he should have. Sandalphon noticed, of course he did, and at first he said nothing, more content to pull away than to reopen another wound. Everytime he did, it hurt Lucifer more. Everytime Lucifer attempted to accommodate him with more space, he could see the rejection clearly on Sandalphon’s face.

They did not talk about the elephant in the room.

The snow stuck, trapping them inside those four walls. It must have become more difficult for Sandalphon to ignore Lucifer’s forlorn gaze upon him and, eventually, one night before they went to turn into bed, he confronted him. “Come springtime, I can talk to Uriel about helping me out with the construction of additional rooms. I know that we wanted to put a guest bedroom in beside the kitchen, but we could add another bedroom by the entryway too.”

“I don’t know that we need that much room— we’re just two people.” Lucifer laughed and averted his gaze quickly. “Unless you want to start hosting more guests?”

A growing look of unease began to manifest on Sandalphon’s features. “I can start sleeping in the living room until it’s finished.”

“There’s no need.” Lucifer’s heart dropped into his stomach.

“I don’t want to—“ Sandalphon stopped and considered his next words carefully. “I know that I’ve woken you a number of times with my bad dreams. I would have to be blind not to know that my presence causes you discomfort. It’s not my intention to cause you pain.”

“I don’t understand.” There it was, the distance that Lucifer had tried to wish away. He was losing Sandalphon all over again.

Sandalphon bit his lip and furrowed his brows. Deep, crimson eyes swirled with emotions unsaid. “I know I messed up by not telling you everything from the start. Pursuing my own happiness, I didn’t stop to consider how you might have felt. I hurt you— I’m still hurting you. After everything, I’m still as selfish as I ever was.”

Lucifer’s face fell. “You could never—”

“I’m not him. I can’t replace him.” Sandalphon stood and closed the book he had been reading. He was still unable to meet his gaze head on. “I need to stop wishing for things to be the way they should have been, they can’t. The Lucifer I knew has been dead far longer than you’ve been alive. I should have buried my heart with him.” Tears began to cascade down Sandalphon’s cheeks and no amount of wiping them away with his sleeve could staunch the flow. 

Lucifer’s eyes grew wide as he watched this unfold, frozen where he stood. His mouth opened to speak words, but nothing came out. Never before had he truly considered Sandalphon’s feelings; never before had he imagined that, when Sandalphon looked at him, he also saw a corpse. What were they doing here? Playing house with the agonizing memories of what they should have laid to rest in the earth? 

“It’s pathetic, isn’t it? How I can’t move on. I can’t let his memory rest.” Sandalphon laughed bitterly, no longer trying to hide his sorrow. It was as if the mask had been discarded. “I’m selfish for putting you in this situation... and for what I’m about to ask of you.” 

Sandalphon clutched the hem of his sweater tightly within his fist. It was the most vulnerable Lucifer had ever seen him before. For the first time, when Lucifer looked upon him, with his tear streaked face and bitten lips, he did not see a stranger. What did it matter what set of stars he was born under or what pair of hands had created him? That was Sandalphon, his Sandalphon. All this time, it had always been.

“I know I said I would before, but I can’t bear to leave your side. Please don’t send me away. I’ll do whatever I need to do to stay. Forget the extra room, I’ll build a new house up on the mountain—”

Such a deep empathy and regret filled Lucifer’s core that, despite all of the walls that were built up between the two of them, he stepped forward, crashing into the invisible barrier, and tore down the structures that separated them. With strong hands that, moments ago had been unsteady from grief, he pulled the smaller angel to his chest and embraced him tightly.

It took Sandalphon a moment to understand what had happened, but before Lucifer could worry that the touch was not welcome, Sandalphon wrapped his own arms around Lucifer’s waist and buried his face into his shoulder. Sandalphon wept openly now, his loud sobs penetrating the quiet of the night. Lucifer cradled him in his arms until their legs gave out and they sank to the floor.

“I love you, Sandalphon, forgive me for not saying it sooner.” Tears, Lucifer’s own tears, wet his cheeks as he ran his hands through Sandalphon’s hair in slow rhythmic motions. “I love you. Please don’t leave me.”

Sandalphon cried harder, his words almost unintelligible through the sobs. “I failed you.” The hoarse whisper came and it took Lucifer a moment to understand that the words were not meant for him. “I couldn’t save you, forgive me. Forgive me.”

“He loved you, the Lucifer of your world.” It felt like a dam in his heart was collapsing. “I also failed him… I never knew how deeply I failed the Sandalphon of this world until now, how your Lucifer must have failed you. Now, I’m failing you all over again. I didn’t understand what gift I had been given with you.”

“Lucifer…” Sandalphon’s voice was utterly broken, but still, to Lucifer, it was the most beautiful sound that had ever graced his ears. Sandalphon. His Sandalphon.

“Thank you for finding me, for saving me, and for not leaving me to grieve alone. I don't know what I did to deserve this kind of compassion from you.” 

“I know I’m different from him.” The grip of Sandalphon’s fists tightened against Lucifer’s shirt, “It must have been harder for you. You’re so much the same as the Lucifer I left behind, but I’ve lived so much longer and changed so much. I’ve been on my own for so long…”

Lucifer could see the years etched into the grief on his face. Gods, he had suffered alone for so long and yet here he was, coming to Lucifer’s rescue again. Lucifer leaned his head down and rested his forehead against Sandalphon’s, exhaling a shaky breath. “You don’t have to be alone ever again; I won’t leave you. Stay with me.”

Sandalphon’s hands were on his cheeks, pulling him in closer and pushing into him. Damp cheeks and warm lips pressed against him, drawing Lucifer down into a kiss. 

His first kiss.

Lucifer’s breath caught in his throat and he tightened his grip on Sandalphon. He pressed his mouth back and his hands molded against his spine, attempting to immortalize the feeling of the one he loved beneath him. Such small shoulders were they to have carried the weight of the world alone. Never again would he let Sandalphon be alone. Lucifer swore it to himself. 

Never again.


	2. Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Before this, Sandalphon’s last memory of Lucifer’s body had been with another’s head sewn to it. Difficult was it for Sandalphon to forget the fearful association tied to that silhouette, the cruel acts that had been done by those very fingers he had once cherished— still cherished.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So uhh... one more chapter after this. I am once again boo boo the fool.

New Years came and suddenly their home was full of warm bodies. It was more people than Sandalphon would normally have enjoyed hosting, but the circumstances were different. These were his friends, whether he could tell them that or not. They didn’t know he’d seen them grow old in another life. Maybe they would never. 

The Singularity, the Captain of the Grandcypher— no, his Captain— came for this gathering. It had been two years since last they spoke and many many thousands more since they’d last been friends. In his world, he had been she, and her name Djeeta instead of Gran. Still, body aside, he was entirely the same, a phenomenon that always existed regardless of the form it took. When they came face to face again, Sandalphon actually fell to his knees and wept, overcome with regret for the way that they had parted. How lucky was he to have a chance to make things right again.

Gran, clearly still wary of Sandalphon from the time that he had thrown him off the edge of an island, was understandably shocked at the reaction, but Sandalphon disregarded it in favor of embracing him. In this place he had never had the chance to make his amends with the crew. Likely, they never would have met again in the first place had he not requested Lucifer seek out their assistance in apprehending Belial.

Lucifer, the blessing that he was, managed to diffuse the situation as Sandalphon moved on to give Lyria and then Vryn the same treatment. He would tell them, Sandalphon decided, when the festivities were over he would explain to them who he was. Maybe they would continue to distrust him, but he owed it to them. In another life they had been his precious friends. If not for the three of them, he would not be the person that he was today.

The kitchen was constantly bustling, trying to churn out food fast enough to satisfy the guests that kept funneling in. Michael complained loudly about how cramped it was on more than one occasion and pulled Uriel and Sandalphon aside to begin plotting out potential expansions for next year. It was ridiculous to have that much space, Sandalphon informed her, the rest of the year the extra room would just be left to gather dust.

“Time to throw more parties then!” Gabriel exclaimed loudly, arm-in-arm with Rosetta and Europa, raising a half drained mug of mead in the air. 

Rosetta laughed, a deep flush settling into her own cheeks. An empty wine glass and its accompanying bottle rested upon the coffee table. “Maybe in the summer? The weather here is so mild— perhaps we could stay outside?”

Yggdrasil chimed back at her in agreement. She stood across the room, critically assessing the state of the struggling window flowers. Later in the evening she would reveal to them that they were using the wrong type of soil and had been watering them too frequently.

“I’d like that.” Lucifer smiled as he caught Sandalphon’s eye from across the room. 

Sandalphon felt his heart flutter. “Me too.”

The festivities were a very cramped two day long ordeal with people constantly coming and going. It wasn’t until the final night, when their last guests left, draining the remaining dredges of alcohol from their glasses, that the pair of them were left alone. He was thoroughly exhausted, but he was happy. 

Sandalphon curled up on the couch, watching as Lucifer finished cleaning up the last of the dishes in the sink. Although he’d already been in this world for longer than a year, he could still scarcely believe that Lucifer was here and very much alive. It was too good to be true. It felt like, if Sandalphon closed his eyes for too long, when he opened them, he’d be left alone in an empty kitchen or worse— 

Lucifer would transform into something that he was not.

Sometimes, if he didn’t look at Lucifer directly, he would mistake those warm blue eyes for ice or a smudge of dirt on his neck for a scar. Their voices were so similar. When Lucifer took on a more stern tone, Sandalphon would find himself unconsciously shrinking away. 

For a time, it had been the same way with Helel Ben Sahar (who, along with Shalem, seemingly did not exist in this world). Before he’d permanently taken on his true form —cut out his own tongue and sewn his lips shut— Sandalphon had often found himself tormented with one memory or another, of the two men he did not want to remember. 

He loved Lucifer, and even now that the same sentiment had been expressed back, Sandalphon was still too afraid to say as much. It was for fear that the depth would not be understood or that the intensity and complexity of the feeling was too great. The years, and Sandalphon had had more than enough of those, did not dull a primal’s emotions. They only intensified them. What he felt for Lucifer was a coin toss that he’d staked everything on. Equally and as passionately did he love and fear him. 

In a moment of weakness, when the barriers had been torn down, Sandalphon had kissed him, and Lucifer had kissed him back. But the meaning behind that act had not carried the same weight between the two of them. It couldn’t.

“You’re staring at me.” An embarrassed grin lit up Lucifer’s cheeks. “Do I have something on my face?”

Sandalphon caught himself and tore his gaze away. “Was I? Must have had too much to drink…”

The last dish was placed on the drying rack and Lucifer made his way over to get a better look. He crouched down in front of Sandalphon, staring at him with a look of faux deep contemplation, “It’s possible, you are bright red.”

Sandalphon groaned and flopped back against the cushions, covering his face with his hands as if that would help him. Beside his head, Lucifer sank down into the cushions, letting out a deep sigh as the weight of the day rolled off his shoulders.

“To be fair, when I was challenged, I’d never seen the Singularity drink that much in one go before.” A short burst of laughter escaped Sandalphon’s lungs.

“I’d hope not, he just recently came of age to drink. I wouldn’t have thought the two of you had time to drink together before. You weren’t giving him alcohol, were you?” Lucifer frowned for a moment and then narrowed his eyes in Sandalphon’s direction. 

“Ah, not this one. The other Singularity.” Quickly, Sandalphon glanced away, unable to hide his guilty look. He couldn’t exactly say that he’d been the best influence on Djeeta’s early drinking habits, but Lucifer didn’t need to know that. “Maybe I’m remembering incorrectly…”

Lucifer sighed and shook his head, leaving the subject be. “Did you speak to the three of them?”

“I did.”

“How did it go?”

A private smile slid onto Sandalphon’s face. “Surprisingly, it went really well. He believed me, they all did. I don’t understand why, but… they really are incredible, aren’t they?”

“They are.” Lucifer shared in the moment with him, leaning his head back to rest against the back of the couch. “The Singularity’s father was an equally fascinating man. He left these skies many years ago, but tales of his adventures still echo throughout the islands. I suppose it’s only right that his son follows in suit.”

A sinking feeling filled Sandalphon’s chest at the memory of that man. Lucifer must not have known— couldn’t have known— what future events the Captain’s father would push into play. So vividly could he remember Djeeta’s blood stained hands and her tear streaked cheeks as she drove her sword through her own father’s chest. There had been so many casualties on that day, she had never been the same after.

But neither had he. If Sandalphon let himself dwell too long on the memory, he could almost hear the death throes of the mortally wounded. He could feel the dead weight of Lyria in his arms and the fading grip of Vryn on his shoulder. How quickly the light could leave one’s eyes. In his own grieving, Sandalphon had cursed the god who had been made whole again by the blood of their sacrifices.

How would this world fare against that same calamity? Here there was no reborn Lucilius or slithering serpent to swing the odds in their favor from the shadows. Could Sandalphon be certain that things would be different this time or were events always destined to end with the same outcome? He didn’t think that he could bear to lose everyone again in that same way. What if Lucilius could still be brought back? What if Lucifer was still in danger of—

“You seem far away, come back.” A melancholic voice tugged him out of his thoughts. His eyes snapped open to see the looming figure that cast a shadow over him. An Icy gaze. stark white hair. Then, without warning, a hand reached out to grasp him. Sandalphon was faster. In a blur of reflexes, he caught the hand before it could wrap around his throat.

“S-Sandalphon?” Lucilius’ voice called out to him, but it was wrong.

It was Lucifer and— damn it, he’d been leaning in close with parted lips. Had he meant to kiss him? If only Sandalphon had his eyes open he wouldn’t have— Sandalphon relinquished his hold. 

“There was a strand of hair in your eyes, forgive me, did I do something wrong?” Lucifer shrank back, drawing his arm into himself.

“What? No—“ Sandalphon pushed himself into a sitting position frantically. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”

Lucifer had no way of knowing the depth and layers of emotions Sandalphon was tormented with when Lucifer drew close enough to touch him. Before this, Sandalphon’s last memory of Lucifer’s body had been with another’s head sewn to it. Difficult was it for Sandalphon to forget the fearful association tied to that silhouette, the cruel acts that had been done by those very fingers he had once cherished— still cherished. 

He was starting to spiral; he couldn’t breathe. Abruptly, Sandalphon climbed to his feet, his eyes darting around the room searching for the nearest exit. He needed air. In response to his panic, the six brilliant wings, four of which had been gifted to him, sprung from his back, preparing to ferry him away even before he reached the back door.

“Where are you…?” Lucifer stood, making to follow him.

“I just—“ He gritted his teeth, cursing his inability to keep these feelings under wraps, “I need some air.”

“Okay.” Lucifer stopped, the reluctance was heavy in his tone. “Just… return to me.”

With shaking hands and heaving lungs, Sandalphon knit his brows together, “I will. Always.”

A look of sorrowful understanding passed across Lucifer’s face and he inclined his head in Sandalphon’s direction. “Go.” His voice was barely above a whisper.

It was all the prompting Sandalphon needed to throw open the exit and plunge into the pitch black night.

——————————————

Sandalphon stayed away from the cottage far longer than he intended to in order to clear his head. In that time, he flew to the top of the valley and roosted among the birds in their heavenly perches. It was cold, the snow fell harder by the day, but he didn’t notice the chill. He had planned to be back by morning, but try as he might, he couldn’t get his head back on his shoulders right.

I was not created to live without you.

The words cycled through his mind on repeat. The one whose lips had spoken them, many millennia ago moved in ceaseless repetition, never growing any less clear even as time decayed his memory. 

Brown hair, red eyes. White hair, blue eyes. Crimson blood, outstretched wings. The creator who breathed his last. There was no salvation for the beast. All that awaited it was either death or ruin. One had chosen the former, he had chosen the later.

It was late afternoon on the fifth day when he finally gathered his thoughts enough to return home. He was caked in a thick layer of grime, hair was matted, and his clothes were filthy, but the moment Lucifer caught sight of him descending from the sheer cliffs on sparrow wings, he walked out to meet him. Like a father welcoming back an undeserving prodigal son, Lucifer drew him a bath, gathering up his dirty laundry and scrubbed the filth from them as he bathed. 

Sandalphon still couldn’t find the words to explain what had happened, but Lucifer didn’t pry. Even as a hot meal was placed before Sandalphon and he put himself back together again, Lucifer did nothing more than make small talk and inquire about his health. The plates were cleared and night had fallen by the time Lucifer rose to brew them both cups of decaffeinated coffee.

“You’re too good to me,” Sandalphon finally croaked out, his voice rough from disuse. “I don’t deserve this.”

Lucifer frowned in his direction. “What’s this about?”

Keeping his gaze fixed on the rough wood of their kitchen table, Sandalphon shook his head, but didn’t answer. A mug, somewhat lopsided with far too thick a handle was placed in front of him. It was handmade and part of a set that Europa and Alexiel had gifted to them. Lucifer drank from the other far less stable looking glass. They were Lucifer’s favorites.

Lucifer sat down across from him and directed his attention to his hands beneath the table, now folded up neatly in his lap. “Have I done something to upset you? When you— no, I must have gotten the wrong idea.”

“No,” he reiterated, biting his lip, “You didn’t.” Patiently, Lucifer waited for him to explain further. He could only imagine how hard it must have been for Lucifer to listen to him talk about the other sky. A portion of Lucifer’s kindness must have only extended to him because of his resemblance to the Sandalphon of this world, but he just couldn’t get around it. Lucifer deserved his honesty. “It’s me, not you. In the other sky when I lost you—” His voice faltered, and the painful memory threatened to overtake him again. 

“If this is too difficult for you—“

“I can do it. Please. Just be patient with me.”

“Okay.” A smile, soft and reassuring, flashed in his direction. “Take as much time as you need.”

It wasn’t fair how good he was. If there was a fault to be found in this man, then Sandalphon would have to scour him for it. “You died by the hands of the one named Beezelbub; the Astral Singularity that I killed in this world’s Canaan. Belial was his accomplice. He defiled your body and used it as a capsule to resurrect the one he loved… to bring back Lucilius.”

Inexplicable emotion blossomed on Lucifer’s face at the mention of the Astral. His eyes shifted away from Sandalphon and a tone, akin to guilt, threaded through his voice. “You know that I know them both well. It was an inevitability, wasn’t it? Was he successful in his plans, is that why you’re here with me now?”

Sandalphon denied it. “Everything was so much bigger than we could have ever imagined. The scale of what he tried to do was negligible compared to what came later, but what he did to me— what I had to do to him in turn—“ That was a step too far for him tonight. He’d already pushed himself further than he knew was wise. Another time maybe, he didn’t want to run again. “I want this too, I value your companionship above all else, but your touch… it’s hard for me...”

The distress softened and, though Lucifer didn’t look up, Sandalphon could see a fraction of relief slip through the cracks. “Of course Sandalphon, I understand. We have all the time in the world, there’s no rush.”

Gods. Lucifer had the patience of a saint, but he couldn’t have had any idea how wrong he was. They did not have endless time. Eventually the millennia would be spent and this world would end as his had, or his core, which had only ever been made as a stand in, would expire. Every second that Sandalphon spent at the mercy of his own anxieties was a moment he was robbing Lucifer of knowing that his feelings were mutual. He needed to act. Now.

“I love you.”

There was an audible intake of air that followed. Lucifer’s lungs filled and held the breath for a moment too long before releasing it again. It was on that release that Sandalphon climbed to his feet and approached him. He leaned forward, pushing into Lucifer’s space, drawing that perfect mouth to his with a confident hold on Lucifer’s chin. Like their first time, it began awkwardly, the angle all wrong and force too great, but eventually it softened as they grew comfortable with the contact. Lucifer must not have had much experience, but it came off as sweet and curious rather than irritating. 

This time, as Lucifer relaxed under him, he seemed to understand what Sandalphon had been unable to clearly voice. He didn’t move to put his hands on him, instead, he let Sandalphon control the moment; pushing back against his lips with only the barest amount of force. The more he pressed forward, the more Lucifer fell slack and pliable beneath him. Even as Sandalphon prodded his tongue against Lucifer’s sealed lips, asking soundlessly to deepen the kiss, Lucifer didn’t move past what was requested. 

Lucifer understood him. Emotion welled up in Sandalphon’s chest. It was in this way that he could suppress the association of those fingertips; the ones that snapped his bones, tore into his flesh, and rained hell upon the sky— Sandalphon pushed the persistent thought away again. He could do this.

Sandalphon dove into Lucifer’s parted lips, relishing in the bitter aftertaste of coffee that clung to his tongue. Gods, it was the best kiss Sandalphon had ever been part of. If not for the odd angle and growing need for oxygen, he would have pushed it further, demanded even more. But eventually, he did pull away from Lucifer, conscious of how it must be hurting his neck. Through loud, even pants, Lucifer regarded him with wide eyes. Now, Sandalphon really regretted not taking the chance to climb into his lap. How would Lucifer have looked straddled beneath him? It was a fantasy he would have to bookmark for another time. 

“Whatever it is that you want from me, in whatever form you need it, it’s yours. My heart already belongs to you.” Lucifer proclaimed his devotion in a clear voice.

Gradually, Sandalphon sank to the floor to kneel at Lucifer’s side and a contented look spread across his face. A hand reached out towards his, which rested atop Lucifer’s thigh, stopping before it could make contact, waiting for him to take it of his own free will. So he did. With a happy sigh, he threaded their fingers together and let his head rest against Lucifer’s hip.

“As does mine.” Sandalphon’s eyes fluttered closed. “It always has and it always will. Thank you.” For creating me.

I was not created to be able to live without you.

The words echoed again in his mind, and, for the first time in thousands of years, did not feel like a curse. 

——————————————

With the coming of January, a new calendar, gifted to them by Lyria, was hung in their kitchen. It marked one full year of Sandalphon and Lucifer’s life together. The rest of the winter months flew by as the pair of them penned their dreams into the empty dates. When finally winter began to melt into spring and the birds returned to build their nests in the delicate branches of the budding orchard, they had more than enough ambitious endeavors planned for the warmer weather. With the sunshine, Halluel and Malluel returned as well, bringing dozens of orders of seeds and tidings from the world outside. According to the messengers, the valley in which they lived had been renamed by locals to ‘Celestial Pass’ because of the frequent sightings of winged beings flying overhead. 

“You two really should get out more!” Halluel prodded between mouthfuls of Lucifer’s most recent attempt at an apple tart. It seemed to be a hit. Sandalphon really was going to have to pay more attention to how he wove those complex designs into the crust. “I don’t think you’ve left this place once since coming here.”

“I don’t see why we would.” Sandalphon huffed as he took his time savoring the piece he’d been served. 

“Once a shut in, always a shut in.” Malluel giggled, leaning into Halluel, opening her mouth wide to demand another bite. Halluel obliged her, lifting the fork up to her parted lips to feed her another morsel. “Mmm, this tastes so good, but I bet it would taste even better coming from your mouth.”

Halluel blushed and waved her hand between them. “Aww Mal! Don’t tease me like that.”

“Can you two stop that, I’m losing my appetite,” Sandalphon grumbled. “We can’t leave until the garden is fully grown.”

“Just get Rosetta to watch the house, she knows how to take care of plants. Come on, you two should come to the beach with all of us! We’ll get you guys swimsuits.”

“I think that sounds like a wonderful idea.” From beside Sandalphon, Lucifer assured the two guests, entirely unbothered by the somewhat erotic display the messenger angels were putting on. 

——————————————

While, sadly, the coffee plants had not survived the frost, the peach trees were thriving. They had more than enough sunlight here and gentle spring showers saved Lucifer from some of his constant fretting over them. Sandalphon didn’t care for the trees as he did, but he often found himself transfixed by the sight of Lucifer meticulously tending to them. 

In his previous life, it would have been impossible.

Compared to this immeasurable joy he felt, knowing every morning for the rest of his life he would wake up to Lucifer by his side, any hardship he had once suffered felt worth it. Sandalphon had lost everything, and in turn he had received a future that could contain both of them in it.

No, the only future that contained both of them.

Many nights he would awaken from nightmares of the red sky and what once had been. Initially, when he awoke, he would find Lucifer laying awake beside him. Now however, more often than not, Lucifer slept soundly through the night and when Sandalphon awoke only the soft sounds of the night greeted him. 

Lucifer was finding a way to move on. Sandalphon was not.

There was still a lot he hadn’t told Lucifer about his past. Some things he would tell him in time, while other things were better left unsaid. His heart still ached for his sky and those that had been left behind. The years Sandalphon spent in Canaan, after his travels with the Singularity, had been long and lonely. He had done much that he wasn’t proud of and made decisions that wouldn’t make sense to the residents of this sky.

Sandalphon knew that this place was different, and that despite the familiar faces, these were not the people he once knew. The dead could not be brought back to life; they came back twisted and wrong, always returning to the afterlife soon after. This was no second chance to go back and fix things. What’s done was done.

It was nights like these that he would ruminate on the past, ever its captive despite the happiness within his grasp. The words spoken to Sandalphon upon the sheer cliffs of Pandemonium, by one equally as isolated as he, always filled his ears even in these quiet moments. 

Belial had caused him much grief over the years, but in the end, he had turned out to be one of his few friends that was with him close to the end. After the true death of the undying Lucilius, Belial at first came to taunt him, but eventually he seemed to tire of that and instead kept him company through more than one long night, commiserating and drinking away the loneliness. With time, it was a companionship that Sandalphon had grown to reluctantly cherish; Belial was one of the few people who understood the depth of Sandalphon’s sorrow. He was one of the few that knew what the true curse primal immortality was. 

And Sandalphon watched him succumb to that curse over the years, helpless to dissuade a man who saw wickedness in the hearts of all others, including his own. Slowly, the purposeless angel wasted away, until he was nothing but a husk of the man he once had been. Madness overtook him eventually, and Sandalphon was left to witness him fade out, to sleep and never awaken. His core remained in Canaan with Sandalphon, as he awaited the day that never came for his friend to return to him.

When the time had come for them to confront the Belial of this world, Lucifer had been shocked when Sandalphon did not hesitate to take his life. It was kindness disguised as a cruelty, and he did not explain himself. He would not watch Belial suffer the same fate again.

As he held the dying man in his arms, Sandalphon leaned in close and whispered his apologies. One’s happiness at the price of another, even if Belial’s happiness was a contradiction in itself. He remembered how Belial had smiled at him, grinning widely as if he knew the truth of everything, before closing his eyes and breathing his last.

Sandalphon was no stranger to loneliness. He had lived a long time and watched too many friends die or fade away. Truthfully, he thought it would go on for forever, and that for all eternity he would be an outsider watching the skies continue to evolve. Everything had an expiration date, however, and this world’s time came before his.

It had been the void in the end, no god or disillusioned angel. There was no way to fight space itself when it rose up like an inky black wall spanning vertically from the Crimson Horizon to beyond the moon. It swallowed everything it touched whole. The edge of the universe must have always been creeping towards them since the beginning of time for it came slowly as if there was no rush. All they could do was run. 

Forced to abandon the solitary fortress of Canaan, to watch the places where he stored his precious memories sink into the dark, Sandalphon buried his tears and turned his attention to the skies. Everyone he could gather he led to the isle of the astrals at the very edge of the sky. Nothing existed beyond it. Thousands and thousands of years ago he had witnessed the hull of the Grandcypher sail off into the sky beyond it, in search of the final mysteries of their world. 

It had never returned.

Despite the impossibility of the odds, Sandalphon couldn’t help but feel that in the end he had failed Lucifer. As he huddled his wings protectively around the last sky dwellers in the skies, blocking them from seeing the end that drew closer by inch, his thoughts returned to the garden. To his eden he had shared with Lucifer and to the man who had taught him to love the sky.

Lucifer, who now lay beside him, sleeping peacefully.

Sandalphon watched Lucifer’s chest rise and fall, his own heart full to the breaking point with love and adoration for him. This had to be what life there was that existed for him after death. Maybe the circumstances weren’t perfect, but it was paradise. Whatever higher power that presided over the creator must have taken notice and granted him a second chance. 

When he had opened his eyes again, after the dark had consumed him, he had been met with many eyes peering at him from inside the void. The void itself had taken notice of him. The mouthpiece it chose was the body of the once-Speaker of Bahamut, Helel Ben Sahar, who had been consumed by his own master in the creator god’s final moments. Whether this was him or only a false imitation of him, Sandalphon did not know, but it was clear at least that the words he spoke were not his own. A mouth had split open from his abdomen, screeching words that Sandalphon could comprehend but not understand. 

All he knew was that he had been given a choice and that he had chosen this. What the choice had been and what other options there had been, he did not know any longer. It didn’t matter, he was here and, finally, he wasn’t alone.

“You’re awake?”

Sandalphon hummed in acknowledgement and Lucifer blinked back at him sleepily. “I am, it’s late. Go back to sleep. Just had something on my mind.”

Lucifer groaned and shook his head. “Not if you’re not going to.”

“Hey,” Sandalphon frowned, “it’s no good when you fall asleep at the breakfast table.”

“I won’t. May I touch you?” Lucifer wiggled an arm out from underneath himself and placed his hand on the pillow beside Sandalphon. 

For only a split second, Sandalphon hesitated. “Yes.” Then, rolling over so that he could loop an arm around Sandalphon’s waist, Lucifer pressed his face into his side. Muffled words were spoken against Sandalphon’s thigh. “What was that?

“I’m going to hug you.” Lucifer informed Sandalphon stubbornly before dragging him down bodily into an embrace. 

Sandalphon’s eyes flew wide as the plane of Lucifer’s warm body pressed up against him and arms enveloped him. “Lucifer!” Touch was getting easier now between the two of them, but Lucifer certainly grew bolder with the haze of sleep over him. 

A sleepy laugh tumbled out of Lucifer’s chest. He placed a peck against the back of Sandalphon’s neck sweetly, his nose rubbing up against his spine. Sandalphon felt the heat rise to his face as more soft kisses followed, peppering against his skin. “Forgive my selfishness, you were just too far away.”

“You’re teasing me!” Sandalphon fidgeted in his arms, not exactly fighting the gentle treatment, but unsure of what to do with himself. For so long Lucifer had been an illusion and an ideal to strive for. Now he was a very tangible wall of muscle that had Sandalphon pinned down and squirming in his clutches.

“Only a little.” Lucifer placed an open-mouth kiss to the crook of his neck and Sandalphon felt his nerves explode with electricity. Sandalphon was —oh gods, he was— getting turned on from this.

Desperately, Sandalphon scrambled to squeeze his thighs together, willing himself to focus on anything but the contact Lucifer’s warm skin made with him. Was he so touch starved that anything would set him off?

“Sandalphon,” Lucifer’s movements stilled and his grip on him slackened. “You seemed far away from here. What were you thinking about?”

Sandalphon felt his breathing slow and his heart steady. “The sky.” He answered truthfully.

“The sky?”

“My sky, the one I left behind.”

“Your sky.” Lucifer paused as if thinking about the word. “Do you miss it?”

“Yes... but also no.” He shook his head. “There’s nothing left for me to return to and all the faces are the same here, except....” Except you’re here.

“This could be your sky too.” Lucifer leaned over Sandalphon, peering at him. Those same blue eyes that had haunted Sandalphon’s dreams hung over him like clear water pools that made men misjudge their depth and drown. They weren’t the same eyes of the Lucifer he’d once known, and yet something in Sandalphon told him that it didn’t matter.

Any Lucifer was Lucifer.

“I would like that.” A kiss was placed against Sandalphon’s cheek and then Lucifer settled back into bed beside him, still holding him close. It was another step forward. 

“Lucifer?” Sandalphon called his attention again.

“Mmm?”

“I want to make graves… for them.”

He could hear Lucifer’s voice strain with emotion. “For the other Sandalphon and Lucifer?”

Sandalphon nodded. “I don’t want us to replace them and I don’t want to forget them.” But we both need closure.

“I think that’s a good idea.”

——————————————

They placed the markers side by side on the mountain that overlooked their home. It was a quiet place with a small mountain pond and a young grove of maple and birch trees. The stones looked smooth and purposeful, not something that would have been placed there by chance, but they chose not to mark them with names. In time they would tell the others who Sandalphon was, but for now they preferred to deal with this at their own pace.

A bed of white lilies was planted around the hedge stones and, through very painstaking labor, the two of them set up a wrought iron garden table and a pair of chairs beside the pond. It felt right to immortalize the blissful summer days they had shared with each other over cups of steaming coffee.

A little ways off, away from the other stones, Sandalphon placed a large, smooth, solitary rock between two dark oak saplings. Around their bases, he planted lavender. Lucifer questioned him about it and with a sad smile Sandalphon informed him that it was to remember an old friend. When Lucifer asked who it was, Sandalphon just shook his head. Lucifer wouldn’t believe him if he told him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Cat for reading this chapter over for me and not just letting me throw it out into the world once it was halfway legible.


	3. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tonight Lucifer was bold, bolder than he had ever been before. Lucifer’s hands, never where Sandalphon couldn’t see them, held his hips firmly and his body bore down on top of him. The pressure was satisfying— maybe too satisfying. Sandalphon shifted his legs as subtly as he could to conceal the growing hardness between them. Lucifer didn’t seem to notice and, if he had, he didn’t seem to mind. 
> 
> “You’re awfully handsy today.” Sandalphon teased as he ran his fingers through the short silver hairs at the nape of Lucifer's neck, pressing kisses against his temple. This he could be content with for the rest of his life, Sandalphon decided. To just be here, held in the arms of the one he loved. But then, something hard pressed against the side of his thigh, smashing to pieces all hope he had of keeping his thoughts in check.
> 
> Lucifer was hard, too.

By mid spring, the flowers that thrived in warmer temperatures began to surface; peeking out fragile shoots to greet the sun. April came, drenching the earth in gentle showers and fine early morning mists that spurred the plants onward, coaxing them out of their dirt hovels. The delicate foliage strengthened and transformed the valley in a flood of green.

Already this sort of life was outwardly changing the two of them. The callouses that Sandalphon had once accumulated from the pommel of his sword were repurposed to the rough shaft of a wood cutting axe. The humidity put a gentle wave into Lucifer’s silver locks while the sun tanned his fair skin and left constellations on his cheeks. At night, as they lay in bed with eyes watching the stars, he would often trace the patterns on Lucifer’s bare skin with the rough pads of his finger tips. To himself, Sandalphon mused that the sky had loved Lucifer so deeply that, when he had relinquished his role, she had been unable to fully part with him. 

No such marks appeared on Sandalphon.

By May, the landscape was lush and green again, and Lucifer’s garden was in full bloom. Together, they gathered up the summer flower seeds and moved them into their greenhouse. A second order of mature coffee plants came and they planted them with the warm weather flowers. Lucifer watched over the shrubs closely, maintaining the environment as carefully as he could. Gabriel teased him, saying that it was becoming a bit of an obsession. Children needed room to breathe if they were to flourish, plants couldn’t be much different. 

It felt a bit ridiculous to Sandalphon, watching Lucifer be schooled by Gabriel when he had, in fact, cultivated the very first coffee tree. But Lucifer listened to her and let his rigid schedule slacken little by little. Almost immediately, the plants began to thrive and blossom, showing signs that they would bear fruit in the coming season. Sandalphon supposed that Lucifer’s willingness to listen to advice may have had something to do with his original success. 

Privately, Sandalphon’s mind returned to the Primordial coffee tree. Once he was certain that coffee trees would thrive year round here, he would he plant the seeds he’d secretly gathered. Even Lucifer didn’t know that he’d gone to fetch them soon after arriving in this world. Sandalphon wondered if Lucifer’s mind ever turned back to that nostalgic bitter flavor.

Despite the lack of private discord between Sandalphon and Lucifer, plans to expand their modest home were not put to rest. Michael and Uriel were fixated on the idea. Celestial valley was quickly becoming a favorite vacation spot for the other archangels and the Grandcypher crew. So the two former primarchs of fire and earth, likely growing restless in their retirement, returned with disciples in tow and put them to work expanding the house.

“We’re not a bunch of freeloaders! We can pay you back for all the times you’ve let us crash here!” Uriel yelled over the sound of a nearby chainsaw Michael was wielding dangerously with one hand. Sandalphon watched miserably as she tore straight through the flimsy wooden supports that held up the shaded entryway. “Besides, I think I’ve put a permanent dent in your couch from sleeping on it. Anything we wreck we’ll put back together much better.” It was true, the whole thing sloped inward on itself now.

“This just seems unnecessary! The house was fine as is.” Sandalphon also shouted, waving his arm in the direction of Alexiel who stood by a pile of rubble, looking incredibly guilty. She’d knocked out an entire kitchen wall with her bare fist. It was only after that she learned that they had only meant for her to take out a small section for a door, but by then it had been too late. Uriel had just taken it as an opportunity to expand the kitchen and make the doorways higher.

The sound of metal tearing through wood stopped abruptly. “It’s looking great darling!” Gabriel lifted up her sunglasses, calling out to Michael the moment the opportunity arose, “keep up the good work!” She lay in her swimsuit, positioned comfortably on a recliner a little ways off, sipping from a glass that Lucifer had served her. The pitcher rested on a small wooden table within arms reach, half drained. Sandalphon could only hope it was lemonade. 

Michael flushed scarlet, “I hardly think this is the place to sunbathe, Gabriel.”

“I don’t see why it wouldn’t be?” Gabriel giggled, topping off her drink. “The view from here is incredible. So many glistening muscles.”

Definitely not lemonade.

By the time they were finished, two other guest rooms, a second bathroom, an upstairs bedroom, and an outdoor patio had been added to what had once been their quaint little cottage. Siero employed the Grandcypher crew to deliver new furniture to fill the empty space— making a point to bring over a guest bed both large and sturdy enough to fit Uriel. The only payment she asked for was done in the form of six jars of jam and one of Lucifer’s now-famous wild berry pies. 

Reluctant as Sandalphon was to admit it, the home expansion was nice. Along with the extra space, the plumbing had been upgraded and the ceiling tiles had been replaced. Their bedroom was relocated upstairs and now included a full open air balcony to accompany the window flowers they grew year round. Lucifer helped him set up a few more planters and soon the plants were flourishing, their leaves spilling out over the balcony in cascading waterfalls of green.

Upon seeing all of the new greenery, Michael commented that, if the two of them were left to their own devices, the wildlife might swallow up the house. Sandalphon, much to Lucifer’s disapproval, combatted this with a jab saying that, if it did, maybe they’d get more peace and quiet if no one could find them. 

——————————————

Fall came again, blessing them with a landscape fitting of an oil painting created by the slumbering primal Caro. This time, when the leaves began to change colors, Sandalphon and Lucifer were ready for it. They donned thick woolen sweaters and wrapped each other up in matching red scarfs before trapezing through the ocean of golden leaves. They had wild berries and nuts to harvest before the frost descended upon them. These they jarred and preserved for the coming winter, shelving them in the storage shed they’d constructed in the green house. 

When they settled down into their bed for that night, crawling under the warm covers, Sandalphon would find their bodies pressed closer than before. It was strange. Before the kiss, sharing a bed in this way had never struck him as anything more than platonic intimacy. It had never even been discussed between the two of them, they had both just assumed that would be the way it was. This was the way that things had been during the many nights they’d spent together when Lucifer visited the research garden. Sandalphon would often sneak away at night to crawl into bed with him. Lucifer would always move over to make room beneath the sheets and they’d talk the night away.

There was a more amorous atmosphere behind it now, with Lucifer’s hands upon him and his mouth tracing the contour of Sandalphon’s jaw. It was growing easier by the day to associate those gentle hands with gentle acts. Sandalphon no longer recoiled at the touch.

Tonight Lucifer was bold, bolder than he had ever been before. Lucifer’s hands, never where Sandalphon couldn’t see them, held his hips firmly and his body bore down on top of him. The pressure was satisfying— maybe too satisfying. Sandalphon shifted his legs as subtly as he could to conceal the growing hardness between them. Lucifer didn’t seem to notice and, if he had, he didn’t seem to mind. 

“You’re awfully handsy today.” Sandalphon teased as he ran his fingers through the short silver hairs at the nape of Lucifer's neck, pressing kisses against his temple. This he could be content with for the rest of his life, Sandalphon decided. To just be here, held in the arms of the one he loved. But then, something hard pressed against the side of his thigh, smashing to pieces all hope he had of keeping his thoughts in check.

Lucifer was hard, too.

Swallowing, Sandalphon fought to keep his attention on the mouth in front of him. These kinds of things happened, sometimes for no good reason— but what if the reason was the same? Sandalphon squeezed his eyes shut. Even if it was, it didn’t necessarily mean that Lucifer wanted that. 

Lucifer was pulling back, placing a distance between the two of them. Sandalphon protested the change with a low whine, but Lucifer did not budge. He was a brick wall, resolute in his actions. The smallest bit frustrated, Sandalphon opened his eyes to peer up at him. “Come back here and kiss me again.”

A noticeable blush had crept up onto Lucifer’s cheeks. He was nervous, Sandalphon realized. The air between them was humming with the intensity at which Lucifer’s core was whirling. “Sandalphon.” Lucifer addressed him seriously. 

“What is it?” Sandalphon sat up. He had his full attention now.

Lucifer’s hand slid up along his side, fingers skimming against the muscles of his abdomen. A heat passed from them into Sandalphon and he swallowed hard. “Can I touch you?”

At that, Sandalphon’s lips parted and his pupils blew wide. He was surprised, yes, but more than that, Sandalphon was uncertain. “You’re already touching me.” He informed Lucifer, returning the gaze with a smoldering intensity. Further he punctuated his words with a light brush of his fingertips against the back of Lucifer’s hand, still resting on his hips. 

Sandalphon wasn’t dense— at least he liked to think that he wasn’t; he could guess at what Lucifer meant, but a conjecture wasn’t enough. Never in Sandalphon’s life had he ever considered this to be a mutual desire. He had to know, explicitly, that Lucifer wanted this too.

“More than this.” Lucifer’s hand stopped its ascent and abruptly changed directions. It smoothed over the thin fabric of Sandalphon’s shirt, traveling over the jut of his hip to land on his thigh. “If you’ll allow me.”

“How much more?”

“As much as you’ll permit. I—“ Lucifer’s confidence was slipping, “I want to join myself with you.”

Sandalphon chewed at his lower lip, his eyes darting from Lucifer’s hand to his face. There was something in him that still refused to believe Lucifer and his roundabout way of requesting. “Do we even have…?”

“Yes.” Lucifer confirmed, sheepishly. “I may have been hoping that you would say yes, so I procured oil.”

When had he…? Placing a hand to his face, Sandalphon covered his mouth. There would be little more that could blatantly confirm Lucifer’s intention than that. Lucifer was meeting the situation with an equal amount of visible embarrassment. “I admit I’m not an expert in this, but I asked Gabriel how these things were meant to be done. She was a very knowledgeable resource and provided me with the proper materials. If you’re patient—“

Then Sandalphon was rising up to meet him, stopping the rest of his words with a chaste kiss. Lucifer closed his mouth. Sandalphon’s hand was on top of Lucifer’s and their fingers intertwined. “I can show you how.”

“Y-you have experience?” Lucifer stuttered.

Sandalphon laughed and raised Lucifer’s palm to his mouth. “I’ve lived too long to not try something, Lucifer. I was friends with Belial, after all.”

If Lucifer had been caught off guard by what he’d said before, he was downright shocked by this revelation. Right, Sandalphon hadn’t told him about that. Lucifer’s fingers twitched nervously by Sandalphon’s face as he peppered his palm with lazy kisses. 

“You were friends?”

“Not this Belial, the other one.”

“But you…?”

“It’s complicated, don’t worry about it.”

“You tried things before, then did you and him… d-did you…?” Lucifer couldn’t seem to find his words.

Through half-lidded eyes, Sandalphon held his gaze as he drew two of Lucifer’s long slender fingers into his mouth and ran his tongue over them slowly. Through a curtain of eyelashes he watched Lucifer’s eyes widen as he drew the fingers all the way into his throat without flinching. Lucifer did not move. In fact, he had stopped breathing. When Sandalphon let the fingers slide back out, they exited with a pop and a trail of spit connected them to his lower lip. “Don’t think about it too much. Just let me take care of you. We can start by getting the oil.”

Lucifer had a hard time tearing his eyes away from Sandalphon, but dutifully, he rose to go and fetch it from another room. He returned with a very clearly marked box and a small vial dwarfed inside his large palm. As he did so, Sandalphon caught sight of the very large and very poorly concealed arousal within the confines of Lucifer’s compression shorts. 

As the oil was passed over to him, Sandalphon swallowed hard. He was a little out of practice for something that size, but there was almost no chance that Lucifer was experienced enough for the reversal of those positions. Sandalphon wanted to go as far with him as he could. He could manage it. Carefully, he placed the vial upright on the nightstand and pulled Lucifer in close to him.

Smooth as can be, Lucifer slid on top of him, following where Sandalphon led as he laid back against the pillows. A smile slid onto Sandalphon’s face, playing into an air of false confidence. “You’ve thought about this before, I take it?”

It was Lucifer’s turn to be nervous now. He shifted his hands awkwardly in the sheets around Sandalphon. “I admit it has crossed my mind before, us joining together in this way.”

Sandalphon’s fingers were against Lucifer’s side, tracing the defined muscles through the thin fabric of his shirt. Truthfully, Sandalphon had never known that he was allowed to want to be with Lucifer in this way. The permission threw open the flood gates of his mind and spurred him onward. Sandalphon took up one of Lucifer’s hands in his own and guided it beneath the hem of his shirt, inviting Lucifer to touch him directly. “So you’ve thought about touching me like this?”

“Yes.” Lucifer’s palm took initiative of his own, prying up the hem of Sandalphon’s shirt as it slid against his skin. A shiver of excitement ran down Sandalphon’s spine as Lucifer passed over his ribs and his fingertips, delicate as can be, stopped at his chest. They brushed over a nipple hesitantly and Sandalphon gasped, releasing the building tension from his lungs.

“You’ve thought about touching me like that too?” Sandalphon questioned, releasing his hand from Lucifer’s wrist.

“I have…”

“Where else?”

A curtain of silver eyelashes lowered over Lucifer’s eyes as his gaze flicked downward in a shy admission of guilt. Sandalphon bit his lip. Such a strong feeling of warmth filled Sandalphon’s chest that for a moment, he couldn’t help but stare at Lucifer despite knowing that the act was embarrassing him.

“Am I allowed to?” Lucifer looked back up at him.

“Yes.” Sandalphon groaned, “Gods, yes. Please, touch me wherever you like. I want this too.”

“Can I see all of you?”

A deep blush spread across Sandalphon’s face, but he nodded. Careful not to elbow Lucifer, Sandalphon took hold of the hem of his shirt and lifted it over his head, baring his chest. Then, not without some struggling, he stripped himself of his leggings and undergarments. 

Sandalphon’s cock, which had yet to be touched, was already standing at attention between the two of them; the full length a dark shade of red. Normally these sort of things he took care of on his own, in the shower or spare bathroom, with a hand over his mouth to muffle the noise. Time apart was not the most common occurrence, and truthfully, he’d come to believe that Lucifer was entirely uninterested in the act and never did the same.

“Do you touch yourself?” Sandalphon voiced his quandary aloud.

The question was met with a pause in which neither of them moved from where they were. Sandalphon glanced up to look at Lucifer curiously, uncertain as to why he wasn’t speaking. When he did so, he was met face to face with Lucifer’s reverent gaze. It swept over his naked body, drinking in every detail. Sandalphon was not one to feel shy in a state of undress, yet here he felt more heat rise to his cheeks.

“When you blush, it goes down to your shoulders.” Lucifer informed him fondly. “I didn’t know.”

“W-what?” Sandalphon colored even deeper. “How can you just say things like that?”

“But you still have that same smile, crooked by just a centimeter, Lucilius was bothered by it to no end.” Lucifer didn’t seem to hear his complaint. Hands were on him again, skimming against his beat red shoulders, drifting down to feel the powerful muscles of his biceps. “Forgive me, you’re so beautiful.”

Sandalphon turned his head away. After everything that Sandalphon had ever heard, this was all it took to unravel him? Gods, Sandalphon was so hopeless for him. With a hesitant grip, Sandalphon reached blindly towards Lucifer, catching the material of his shirt between clammy fingers. He tugged at it insistently. “Lucifer… take your clothes off already, I don’t want to be the only one and they’re getting in the way.”

“Ah, I apologize. I forgot myself.” Lucifer relinquished the contact and turned his attention back to himself. With dexterous hands, he took hold of the hem of his shirt and lifted it over his head, revealing taut skin over a visibly muscled abdomen. Lucifer was a tree, tall and strong, topped with thick biceps and broad shoulders, while still retaining a relatively lean frame. Next to that gentle face it was almost jarring watching him start to ease the band of his compression shorts off those impressive thighs. 

Sandalphon was transfixed by the sight. So much so that, when Lucifer’s movements stopped, he found that he needed to remind himself not to reach forward and finish the deed himself. For a moment, he stayed at the edge of his seat, waiting for Lucifer to continue. When he did not, Sandalphon tore his gaze away from and peered up at him. 

“Is something the matter?”

There was no response.

“What’s going on?” Sandalphon prompted him again. A sinking feeling began to settle in his chest. Something was wrong. Lucifer felt far away from here, his gaze was fixed on his own hands. “Talk to me”

“I don’t know...” the vague reply came.

Sandalphon sat up to join Lucifer. His hand found Lucifer’s back and he peered up at him sympathetically. A battle of wills was being waged behind those mirror-like eyes that Sandalphon was not privy to. A thought occurred to him. What if all along, Lucifer had been doing this for Sandalphon and not himself? What if Lucifer had forced himself outside of his comfort zone in order to meet the desire that Sandalphon had never voiced, but had failed to keep quiet? 

“Hey, if you’re pushing yourself to do this, we can stop.”

“No I—” Lucifer began, but then he stopped.

“Look at me.” Sandalphon pressed his hands to Lucifer’s cheeks and positioned himself directly in front of Lucifer, giving him no choice but to meet his gaze. Lucifer’s eyes were wide and vacant. His breathing was fast, too fast. “You’re panicking.” Sandalphon realized.

Oh gods— what had Sandalphon done to put him in this sort of state? Had he said something out of line? Thinking back, he couldn’t identify a specific exchange, and yet, here Lucifer was, visibly shaking beneath his touch; suffering almost wordlessly.

“I’m…” Despite the steadying grip, Lucifer wouldn’t focus on what lay in front of him. “Lucilius, he’s…”

Lucilius?

“Deep breaths, I’m here for you.” Sandalphon assured him in a commanding voice. It was becoming increasingly clear that whatever was unsettling Lucifer might have been beyond the situation at hand. “You’re safe here.”

Then, for the first time, between the fast shallow pants, Lucifer took a long deep breath and his eyes seemed to focus on Sandalphon. Slowly, for it felt like an eternity, as Sandalphon continued to reassure Lucifer, his breathing slowed and his shoulders slumped. “I apologize…”

“Don’t.” Making to pull away, Sandalphon retracted his hand from Lucifer’s face, but the receding hold was caught. Gently, Sandalphon replaced it in his hair, combing his fingers through Lucifer’s bright silver locks. 

Ever so slowly and ever so lightly, Lucifer leaned forward to rest his forehead against Sandalphon’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

“This might have been too much for us right now. Don’t push yourself.” Hunched over like this, Lucifer’s proud, broad, shoulders seemed impossibly small. Could it be that Sandalphon had somehow made him feel like this was necessary? “I’m happy with the way things are. You don’t need to prove anything to me.” Silence permeated the room. “It’s getting late, let’s go to bed.”

Without allowing room for protest, Sandalphon guided the pair of them back down onto the sheets and kissed Lucifer goodnight.

——————————————

What went on that night went blatantly unaddressed. Lucifer, Sandalphon inferred, had no desire to discuss what had happened between the two and so, their lives continued on with an ever present weight on Sandalphon’s shoulders. There was no mention from either of them of a second attempt at the fumbled courtship. It was another wall between the two of them that presented itself in the form of hesitant touches and respectful distance. 

Sandalphon wouldn’t admit it aloud, but he was afraid; afraid of what he might have done to have caused such a reaction. From what he could tell, Lucifer had wanted it as well, but could he be certain? What if all those words had just been for his sake; a collection of pretty lies intended to assure Sandalphon of his devotion. In the end he was what he had been from the beginning, a spare. The only difference now was that he was no longer a spare primarch, but a spare Sandalphon. Here he was trying to fill in the gaps that the last one had left behind. 

Today, these thoughts cycled through Sandalphon’s mind as he raised the wood cutting axe above his head and brought it back down over a log in a mind numbing rhythm. If this was like any other day before, they would persist from morning until evening and then continue to plague him into the long hours of the night.

So badly did Sandalphon want to ask Lucifer about what had gone on that night, but what if the answer only confirmed his suspicions? Again, he would be left with a choice; stay and continue to harm Lucifer, or leave and save Lucifer from the blight that he was. The answer was clear, but Sandalphon hesitated— he always hesitated. All of those times, save one, when Sandalphon had snuck out through the window, he had intended to leave and never return, but he never could bring himself to do it. In all his many years of life it seemed he’d never learned this kind of courage. 

Breath gathered in the air in front of him, the chill making it visible to the naked eye. His gaze turned somberly toward the light in their kitchen window. Lucifer would be there now, back from weeding the peach trees and gathering herbs. Tonight was Lucifer’s turn to cook, so he’d be starting on dinner about now. Sandalphon’s heart grew soft thinking of how Lucifer would look pulling his favorite gaudy apron on over his head and tying it in front.

If Sandalphon left now, it was a sight he’d never see again, but maybe that was how it was meant to be. His world had suffered without Lucifer, but no sky would fail without him. Sandalphon’s destiny must have been to save Lucifer’s life and then leave. 

Sandalphon’s grip on his axe fell slack and the tool clattered to the cobble stone floor of the front patio. Now. Sandalphon would have to do it now while he was feeling bold. A heavy weight manifested on his back as his twelve wings, ten of them borrowed, burst forth from his back. He stretched them out, letting their full wingspan, disproportionate to his height, extend out through the early evening air. 

There would be no coming back to this peaceful place, Sandalphon reminded himself, taking one last look around at the valley. His eyes raked over the green house and the peach trees, then passed over the garden until finally they settled on the silhouette that rested in the window. In the fading light, he could easily make out Lucifer’s features behind the clear glass barrier. Sandalphon’s heart felt as if it weighed a thousand pounds and that each and every ounce of it would drag behind him as he left. It didn’t matter.

Suddenly, Lucifer’s eyes were upon him, confusion written into the deep set lines between his brows. The realization was dawning. In only an instant of hesitation, Sandalphon had transformed this into a race against time. But, anxiety was the springboard he needed. With a decisive spin, he turned and pushed off from the ground, his powerful wings making up for the poor take off. 

As the ground began to shrink away from him, he saw the front door fly open and Lucifer’s own six wings snap out from his back. He meant to give chase. 

In a matter of seconds, Sandalphon was above the mountains that enclosed their valley and the stars were upon him. He jerked his head from side to side, wasting precious time, before tearing off in a meaningless direction. At full speed, twelve wings could outpace six with ease, but his pauses were going to cost him. Lucifer was gaining on him already, cutting the corners out of Sandalphon’s trajectory. Before he could even reach top speed, a hand enclosed around his ankle. 

Unwilling to try and kick Lucifer off of himself, Sandalphon slowed until they were at a speed where they could comfortably coast. Still, Lucifer did not let go. A white wing nudged against his brown one and Sandalphon turned back to look at the other, his face a clear admission of his guilt. Lucifer’s own expression was carefully neutral and all he did was point down to the house indicating that he wanted to land there. The pair of them angled their wings for the descent.

Only when they were just about to land did Lucifer finally relinquish his hold on Sandalphon. For a moment, Sandalphon considered trying to run again, but he resisted the urge. They would talk and he would explain himself, then, when Lucifer admitted the truth, Sandalphon would leave. It would hurt more this way, but it was the best way forward now.

Through the window, Sandalphon could see that dinner was boiling over. Quickly, he rushed back into the house and pulled it off the burner. Lucifer was hot on his heels, moving to save what he could of the ruined food. 

“Why did you follow me?” Sandalphon recalled his wings and asked in a voice that betrayed nothing.

Lucifer did the same, returning the kitchen to it’s usual spacious living space. “The way you looked at me, it made me feel like it was the right thing to do.” Lucifer looked ridiculous, Sandalphon realized, barefoot and wearing that awful frilly apron of his, his hair a mess from flight. He’d chased after Sandalphon even at the risk of burning down the house. Creators, he shouldn’t have hesitated; Sandalphon’s resolve was weakening again. “Where were you going?”

“Away.”

“Where?” Lucifer’s brows pinched together.

“I don’t know.”

“Why?”

“I shouldn’t be here anymore.”

“Why?” The question came again and Lucifer turned off the stove with a quiet sigh, giving up on the food entirely. 

Sandalphon let out a frustrated grunt in response. “Because! I don’t know!” He recalled his wings and grabbed a dishcloth to clean up the water that had spilled on the floor. Sandalphon mopped it up, furiously, channeling his frustration into the action. Even after the floor was completely dry, he kept going. 

A hand appeared on his arm, “Sandalphon, stop. It’s dry.”

Sandalphon sighed and dropped his arm to his side. “No matter how hard I try not to, I keep hurting you.”

Relinquishing his grip, Lucifer frowned, biting his bottom lip. “We need to talk. Go sit down, I’ll make some decaf. ”

——————————————

Dinner became a collection of tarts and shortbread cookies served alongside two cups of steaming coffee. Sandalphon’s appetite was not present, but he forced down two of the pastries knowing full well that Lucifer wouldn’t talk until after he’d eaten. Talk about what though? The anticipation churned up the sugary desserts in his stomach, making him feel ill. 

One step forward, two steps back.

It wasn’t until after Lucifer saw him drain the final dredges from his cup that he proceeded. “Tell me what this is about.”

Sandalphon, despite his dread that dwelt within his heart, kept his eyes trained downward and the frown plastered on his face. He felt like an impetuous child being lectured. “I’m leaving.”

“Will you be back?”

“No.”

Lucifer looked hurt. “Have I wronged you in some way?”

“No, I just—“ He gritted his teeth, “This isn’t working between us.”

“Sandalphon… What makes you say that?”

“The other night, I hurt you again.”

Lucifer’s eyes shifted to the side and he turned his head to follow them. “That wasn’t your fault. I… remembered something unpleasant.”

There was an extended silence that followed before Sandalphon prompted him to continue. “What do you mean?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this is a terrible place to end a chapter, but bear with me. I do another magic trick where I tell you to close your eyes and pretend the chapter count didn’t change again. There’s four chapters now and by God, even if the last chapter ends up being 10k+ it’s gonna be the last one. (Thank you Cat for proof reading this sucker)

**Author's Note:**

> As always, thank you to Cat, Ellie, Ara, and (the real) Grey for the beta work you guys did on this fic (and a shout out to Ro who watched the massacre happen). I truly love this GBF community and how we feed each other.


End file.
